II. THE HELLENIST APOSTLES. (continued 2)

Εξαιρουμενος σε εκ τοῦ λαοῦ και τῶν ἐθνῶν, εις οὑς νῦν σε ΑΠΟΣΤΕΛΛΩ.

All this took place while the whole company of travelers were lying prostrate on the ground, stunned and almost senseless. Of all those present, however, Saul only heard these solemn words of warning, command, and prophecy, thus sent from heaven in thunder; for he himself afterwards, in narrating these awful events before the Jewish multitude, expressly declares “the men that were with me, saw the light, indeed, and were afraid; but they heard NOT the voice of him who spoke to me.” And though in the previous statement given by Luke, in the regular course of the narrative, it is said that “the men who journeyed with Saul were speechless,――hearing a voice, but seeing no man;” yet the two statements are clearly reconciled by the consideration of the different meanings of the word translated “voice” in both passages, but which the accompanying expressions sufficiently limit in the latter case only to the articulate sounds of a human voice, while in the former it is left in such terms as to mean merely a “sound,” as of thunder, or any thing else which can be supposed to agree best with the other circumstances. To them, therefore, it seemed only surprising, not miraculous; for they are not mentioned as being impressed, otherwise than by fear and amazement, while Saul, who alone heard the words, was moved thereby to a complete conversion. The whole circumstances, therefore, allow and require, in accordance with other similar passages, that the material phenomena which were made the instruments of this miraculous conversion, were, as they are described, first a flash of lightning, which struck the company to the earth, giving all a severe shock, but affecting Saul most of all, and, second, a peal of thunder, heard by all as such, except Saul, who distinguished in those awful, repeated sounds, the words of a heavenly voice, with which he held distinct converse, while his wondering companions thought him only muttering incoherently to himself, between the peals of thunder;――just as in the passage related by John, when Jesus called to God, “Father! glorify thy name;” and then there came a voice from heaven, saying, “I both have glorified it and will glorify it;” yet the people who then stood by, said, “It thundered,”――having no idea of the expressive utterance which was so distinctly heard by Jesus and his disciples. There is no account, indeed, in either case, of any thunder storm accompanying the events; but there is nothing in the incidents to forbid it; and the nature of the effects upon the company who heard and saw, can be reconciled only with the supposition of a burst of actual thunder and lightning, which God made the organ of his awful voice, speaking to Saul in words that called him from a course of sin and cruelty, to be a minister of grace, mercy and peace, to all whose destroying persecutor he had before been. The sequel of the effects, too, are such as would naturally follow these material agencies. The men who were least stunned, rose to their feet soon after the first shock; and when the awful scene was over, they bestirred themselves to lift up Saul, who was now found, not only speechless, but blind,――the eyes being so dazzled by such excess of light, that the nerve loses all its power, generally, forever. Saul being now raised from the ground, was led, helpless and thunder-struck, by his distressed attendants, into the city, which he had hoped to make the scene of his cruel persecutions, but which he now entered, more surely bound, than could have been the most wretched of his destined captives.

Kuinoel and Bloomfield will furnish the inquiring reader with the amusing details of the hypotheses, by which some of the moderns have attempted to explain away the whole of Saul’s conversion, into a mere remarkable succession of natural occurrences, without any miracle at all.

HIS STAY IN DAMASCUS.

Thus did the commissioned persecutor enter the ancient capital of Aram. But as they led him along the flowery ways into this Syrian paradise, how vain were its splendors, its beauties and its historic glories, to the eyes which had so long strained over the far horizon, to catch the first gleam of its white towers and rosy gardens, beyond the mountain-walls. In vain did Damascus invite the admiring gaze of the passing traveler, to those damask roses embowering and hedging his path, which take their name in modern times, from the gardens where they first bloomed under the hand of man. In vain did their fragrance woo his nobler sense to perceive their beauty of form and hue; in vain did the long line of palaces and towers and temples, still bright in the venerable splendor of the ancient Aramaic kings, rise in majesty before him. The eyes that had so often dwelt on these historical monuments, in the distant and brilliant fancies of studious youth, were now closed to the not less brilliant splendors of the reality; and through the ancient arches of those mighty gates, and along the crowded streets, amid the noise of bustling thousands, the commissioned minister of wrath now moved distressed, darkened, speechless and horror-struck,――marked, like the first murderer, (of whose crime that spot was the fabled scene,) by the hand of God. The hand of God was indeed on him, not in wrath, but in mercy, sealing his abused bodily vision for a short space, until his mental eyes, purified from the scales of prejudice and unholy zeal, should have become fitted for the perception of objects, whose beauty and glory should be the theme of his thoughts and words, through all his later days, and of his discourse to millions for whom his heart now felt no love, but for whose salvation he was destined to freely spend and offer up his life. Passing along the crowded ways of the great city, under the guidance of his attendants, he was at last led into the street, which for its regularity was called the “Straight Way,” and there was lodged in the house of a person named Judas,――remaining for three days in utter darkness, without the presence of a single friend, and without the glimmer of a hope that he should ever again see the light of day. Disconsolate and desolate, he passed the whole of this period in fasting, without one earthly object or call, to distract his attention from the solemn themes of his heavenly vision. He had all this long interval for reflection on the strange reversion of destiny pointed out by this indisputable decree, which summoned him from works of cruelty and destruction, to deeds of charity, kindness and devotion to those whose ruin he had lately sought with his whole heart. At the close of this season of lonely but blessed meditation, a new revelation of the commanding presence of the Deity was made to a humble and devout Christian of Damascus, named Ananias, known even among the Jews as a man of blameless character. To him, in a vision, the Lord appeared, and calling him by name, directed him most minutely to the house where Saul was lodging, and gave him the miraculous commission of restoring to sight that same Saul, now deprived of this sense by the visitation of God, but expecting its restoration by the hands of Ananias himself, who though yet unknown to him in the body, had been distinctly seen in a vision by the blind sufferer, as his healer, in the name of that Jesus who had met him in the way and smote him with this blindness, dazzling him with the excess of his unveiled heavenly glories. Ananias, yet appalled by the startling view of the bright messenger, and doubting the nature of the vision which summoned him to a duty so strangely inconsistent with the dreadful fame and character of the person named as the subject of his miraculous ministrations, hesitated to promise obedience, and parleyed with his summoner. “Lord! I have heard by many, of this man, how much evil he has done to thy saints at Jerusalem; and here, he has commission from the chief priests to bind all that call on thy name.” The merciful Lord, not resenting the rational doubts of his devout but alarmed servant, replied in words of considerate explanation, renewing his charge, with assurances of the safe and hopeful accomplishment of his appointed task. “Go thy way: for he is a chosen instrument of mercy for me, to bear my name before nations and kings, and the children of Israel: for I will show him how great things he must suffer for the sake of my name.” Ananias, no longer doubting, now went his way as directed, and finding Saul, clearly addressed him in terms of confidence and even of affection, recognizing him, on the testimony of the vision, as already a friend of those companions of Jesus, whom he had lately persecuted. He put his hands on him, in the usual form of invoking a blessing on any one, and said, “Brother Saul! the Lord Jesus, who appeared to thee in the way, as thou camest, has sent me, that thou mightest receive thy sight, and be filled with a holy spirit.” And immediately there fell from the eyes of the blinded persecutor, something like scales, and he saw now, in bodily, real presence, him who had already been in form revealed to his spirit, in a vision. At the same moment, fell from his inward sense, the obscuring film of prejudice and bigotry. Renewed in mental vision, he saw with the clear eye of confiding faith and eternal hope, that Jesus, who in the full revelation of his vindictive majesty having dazzled and blinded him in his murderous career, now appeared to his purified sense, in the tempered rays and mild effulgence of redeeming grace. Changed too, in the whole frame of his mind, he felt no more the promptings of that dark spirit of cruelty, but, filled with a holy spirit, before unknown to him, he began a new existence, replete with the energies of a divine influence. No longer fasting in token of distress, he now ate, by way of thanksgiving for his joyful restoration, and was strengthened thereby for the great task which he had undertaken. He was now admitted to the fellowship of the disciples of Jesus, and remained many days among them as a brother, mingling in the most friendly intercourse with those very persons, against whom he came to wage exterminating ruin. Nor did he confine his actions in his new character to the privacies of Christian intercourse. Going immediately into the synagogues, he there publicly proclaimed his belief in Jesus Christ, and boldly maintained him to be the Son of God. Great was the amazement of all who heard him. The fame of Saul of Tarsus, as a ferocious and determined persecutor of all who professed the faith of Jesus, had already pervaded Palestine, and spread into Syria; and what did this strange display now mean? They saw him, whom they had thus known by his dreadful reputation as a hater and exterminator of the Nazarene doctrine, now preaching it in the schools of the Jewish law and the houses of worship for the adherents of Mosaic forms, and with great power persuading others to a similar renunciation of all opposition to the name of Jesus; and they said, “Is not this he who destroyed them that called on this name in Jerusalem, and came hither, with the very purpose of taking them bound, to the Sanhedrim, for punishment?” But Saul, each day advancing in the knowledge and faith of the Christian doctrine, soon grew too strong in argument for the most skilful of the defenders of the Jewish faith; and utterly confounded them with his proofs that Jesus was the very Messiah. This triumphant course he followed for a long time; until, at last, the stubborn Jews, provoked to the highest degree by the defeats which they had suffered from this powerful disputant, lately their most zealous defender, took counsel to put him to death, as a renegade from the faith, of which he had been the trusted professor, as well as the commissioned minister of its vengeance on the heretics whose cause he had now espoused, and was defending, to the great injury and discredit of the Judaical order. In contriving the means of executing this scheme, they received the support and assistance of the government of the city,――Damascus being then held, not by the Romans, but by Aretas, a petty king of northern Arabia. The governor appointed by Aretas did not scruple to aid the Jews in their murderous project; but even himself, with a detachment of the city garrison, kept watch at the gates, to kill Saul at his first outgoing. But all their wicked plots were set at nought by a very simple contrivance. The Christian friends of Saul, hearing of the danger, determined to remove him from it at once; and accordingly, one night, put the destined apostle of the Gentiles in a basket; and through the window of some one of their houses, which adjoined the barriers of the city, they let him down outside of the wall, while the spiteful Jews, with the complaisant governor and his detachment of the city guard, were to no purpose watching the gates with unceasing resolution, to wreak their vengeance on this dangerous convert.

Michaelis alludes to the difficulties which have arisen about the possession of Damascus by Aretas, and concludes as follows:

“The force of these objections has been considerably weakened, in a dissertation published in 1755, ‘De ethnarcha Aretae Arabum regis Paulo insidiante,’ by J. G. Heyne, who has shown it to be highly probable, first, that Aretas, against whom the Romans, not long before the death of Tiberius, made a declaration of war, which they neglected to put in execution, took the opportunity of seizing Damascus, which had once belonged to his ancestors; an event omitted in Josephus, as forming no part of the Jewish history, and by the Roman historians as being a matter not flattering in itself, and belonging only to a distant province. Secondly, that Aretas was by religion a Jew,――a circumstance the more credible, when we reflect that Judaism had been widely propagated in that country, and that even kings in Arabia Felix had recognized the law of Moses. * * * And hence we may explain the reason why the Jews were permitted to exercise, in Damascus, persecutions still severer than those in Jerusalem, where the violence of their zeal was awed by the moderation of the Roman policy. Of this we find an example in the ninth chapter of the Acts, where Paul is sent by the high priest to Damascus, to exercise against the Christians, cruelties which the return of the Roman governor had checked in Judea. These accounts agree likewise with what is related in Josephus, that the number of Jews in Damascus amounted to ten thousand, and that almost all the women, even those whose husbands were heathens, were of the Jewish religion.” (Michaelis, Introduction, Vol. IV. Part I. c. ii. § 12.)

HIS RESIDENCE IN ARABIA.

On his escape from this murderous plot, Saul, having now received from God, who called him by his grace, the revelation of his Son, that he might preach him among the heathen, immediately resolved not to confer with any mortal, on the subject of his task, and therefore refrained from going up to Jerusalem, to visit those who were apostles before him. Turning his course southeastward, he found refuge from the rage of the Damascan Jews, in the solitudes of the eastern deserts, where, free alike from the persecutions and the corruptions of the city, he sought in meditation and lonely study, that diligent preparation which was necessary for the high ministry to which God had so remarkably called him. A long time was spent by him in this wise and profitable seclusion; but the exact period cannot be ascertained. It is only probable that more than a year was thus occupied; during which he was not a mere hermit, indeed, but at any rate, was a resident in a region destitute of most objects which would be apt to draw off his attention from study. That part of Arabia in which he took refuge, was not a mere desert, nor a wilderness, yet had very few towns, and those only of a small size, with hardly any inhabitants of such a character as to be attractive companions to Saul. After some time, changes having taken place in the government of Damascus, he was enabled to return thither with safety, the Jews being now checked in their persecuting cruelty by the re-establishment of the Roman dominion over that part of Syria. He did not remain there long; but having again displayed himself as a bold assertor of the faith of Jesus, he next set his face towards Jerusalem, on his return, to make known in the halls of those who had sent him forth to deeds of blood, that their commission had been reversed by the Father of all spirits, who had now not only summoned, but fully equipped, their destined minister of wrath, to be “a chosen instrument of mercy” to nations who had never yet heard of Israel’s God.

The different accounts given of these events, in Acts ix. 19‒25, and in Galatians i. 15‒24, as well as 2 Corinthians xi. 32‒33, have been united in very opposite ways by different commentators, and form the most perplexing passages in the life of Saul. The journey into Arabia, of which he speaks in Galatians i. 17, is supposed by most writers, to have been made during the time when Luke mentions him as occupied in and about Damascus; and it is said that he went thence into Arabia immediately after his conversion, before he had preached anywhere; and such writers maintain that the word “straightway,” or “immediately,” in Acts ix. 20, (ευθεως,) really means, that it was not until a long time after his conversion that he preached in the synagogues!! Into this remarkable opinion they have been led by the fact, that Saul himself says, (Galatians i. 16,) that when he was called by God to the apostleship, “immediately he conferred not with flesh and blood, nor went up to Jerusalem, but went into Arabia.” All this however, is evidently specified by him only in reference to the point that he did not derive his title to the apostleship from “those that were apostles before him,” nor from any human authority; and full justice is therefore done to his words, by applying them only to the fact, that he went to Arabia before he went to Jerusalem, without supposing them to mean that he left Damascus immediately after his baptism by Ananias. All the historical writers however, seem to take this latter view. Witsius, Cappel, Pearson, Lardner, Murdock, Hemsen, &c. place his journey to Arabia between his baptism and the time of his escape, and suppose that when he fled from Damascus, he went directly to Jerusalem. In the different arrangement which I make of these events, however, I find myself supported by most of the great exegetical writers, as Wolf, Kuinoel, and Bloomfield; and I can not better support this view than in the words of the latter.

Acts ix. 19. “ἐγένετο δὲ ὁ Σαῦλος. Paul (Galatians ♦i. 17,) relates that he, after his conversion, did not proceed to Jerusalem, but repaired to Arabia, and from thence returned to Damascus. Hence, according to the opinion of Pearson, in his Annales Paulini, p. 2. the words ἐγένετο δὲ ὁ Σαῦλος are to be separated from the preceding passage, and constitute a new story, in which is related what happened at Damascus after Saul’s return from Arabia. But the words ἱκαναὶ ἡμέραι may and ought to be referred to the whole time of Paul’s abode at Damascus, before he went into Arabia; and thus with the ἱκαναὶ ἡμέραι be numbered the ἡμέραι τινὲς mentioned at verse 19: for the sense of the words is this: ‘Saul, when he spent some days with the Damascene Christians, immediately taught in the synagogues. Now Luke entirely passes by Paul’s journey into Arabia. (Kuinoel.) Doddridge imagines that his going into Arabia, (to which, as he observes, Damascus now belonged,) was only making excursions from that city into the neighboring parts of the country, and perhaps taking a large circuit about it, which might be his employment between the time in which he began to preach in Damascus, and his quitting it after having been conquered by the Romans under Pompey.’ But in view of this subject I cannot agree with him. The country in the neighborhood of Damascus is not properly Arabia.”

22‒24. “ὡς δὲ ἐπληροῦντο――ἀνελεῖν αὐτόν. In 2 Corinthians xi. 32, we read that the Ethnarch of Aretas, king of Arabia, had placed a guard at the gates of Damascus, to seize Paul. Now it appears that Syria Damascene was, at the end of the Mithridatic war, reduced by Pompey to the Roman yoke. It has therefore been inquired how it could happen that Aretas should then have the government, and appoint an Ethnarch. That Aretas had, on account of the repudiation of his daughter by Herod Antipas, commenced hostilities against that monarch, and in the last year of Tiberius (A. D. 37,) had completely defeated his army, we learn from Josephus Antiquities, 18, 5, 1. seqq. Herod had, we find, signified this by letter to Tiberius, who, indignant at this audacity, (Josephus L. c.) gave orders to Vitellius, prefect of Syria, to declare war against Aretas, and take him alive, or send him his head. Vitellius made preparations for the war, but on receiving a message acquainting him with the death of Tiberius, he dismissed his troops into winter quarters. And thus Aretas was delivered from the danger. At the time, however, that Vitellius drew off his forces, Aretas invaded Syria, seized Damascus, and continued to occupy it, in spite of Tiberius’s stupid successor, Caligula. This is the opinion of most commentators, and among others, Wolf, Michaelis, and Eichhorn. But I have already shewn in the Prolegomena § de chronologia lib. 2, 3, that Aretas did not finally subdue Damascus until Vitellius had already departed from the province.” (Kuinoel.) (Bloomfield’s Annotations, Vol. IV. pp. 322‒324.)

HIS RETURN TO JERUSALEM.

Arriving in the city, whence only three years before he had set out, in a frame of mind so different from that in which he returned, and with a purpose so opposite to his present views and plans,――he immediately, with all the confidence of Christian faith, and ardent love for those to whom his religious sympathies now so closely fastened him, assayed to mingle in a familiar and friendly manner with the apostolic company, and offered himself to their Christian fellowship as a devout believer in Jesus. But they, already having too well known him in his previous character as the persecutor of their brethren, the aider and abettor in the murder of the heroic and innocent Stephen, and the greatest enemy of the faithful,――very decidedly repulsed his advances, as only a new trick to involve them in difficulties, that would make them liable to punishment which their prudence had before enabled them to escape. They therefore altogether refused to receive Saul; for “they were all afraid of him, and believed not that he was a disciple.” In this disagreeable condition,――cast out as a hypocrite, by the apostles of that faith, for which he had sacrificed all earthly prospects,――he was fortunately found by Barnabas, who being, like Saul, a Hellenist Jew, naturally felt some especial sympathy with one whose country was within a few miles of his own; and by this circumstance, being induced to notice the professed convert, soon recognized in him, the indubitable signs of a regenerated and sanctified spirit, and therefore brought him to the chief apostles, Peter, and James, the Lord’s brother; for with these alone did Saul commune, at this visit, as he himself distinctly testifies. Still avoiding the company of the great mass of the apostles and disciples, he confined himself almost wholly to the acquaintance of Peter, with whom he abode in close familiarity for fifteen days. In order to reconcile the narrative of Luke in the Acts, with the account given by Saul himself, in the first chapter of the epistle to the Galatians, it must be understood that the “apostles” spoken of by the former are only the two above-mentioned, and it was with these only that he “went in and out at Jerusalem,”――the other apostles being probably absent on some missionary duties among the new churches throughout Judea and Palestine. Imitating the spirit of the proto-martyr, whose death he had himself been instrumental in effecting, “he spoke boldly in the name of the Lord Jesus, and disputed against the Hellenists,” doubtless the very same persons among whom he himself had formerly been enrolled as an unshrinking opposer of that faith which he was now advocating. By them he was received with all that vindictive hate which might have been expected; and he was at once denounced as a vile renegade from the cause which in his best days he had maintained as the only right one. To show most satisfactorily that, though he might change, they had not done so, they directly resolved to punish the bold disowner of the faith of his fathers, and would soon have crowned him with the fate of Stephen, had not the disciples heard of the danger which threatened the life of their new brother, and provided for his escape by means not less efficient than those before used in his behalf, at Damascus. Before the plans for his destruction could be completed, they privately withdrew him from Jerusalem, and had him safely conducted down to Caesarea, on the coast, whence, with little delay, he was shipped for some of the northern parts of Syria, from which he found his way to Tarsus,――whether by land or sea, is unknown.

HIS VISIT TO TARSUS.

This return to his native city was probably the first visit which he had made to it, since the day when he departed from his father’s house, to go to Jerusalem as a student of Jewish theology. It must therefore have been the occasion of many interesting reflections and reminiscences. What changes had the events of that interval wrought in him,――in his faith, his hopes, his views, his purposes for life and for death! The objects which were then to him as idols,――the aims and ends of his being,――had now no place in his reverence or his affection; but in their stead was now placed a name and a theme, of which he could hardly have heard before he first left Tarsus,――and a cause whose triumph would be the overthrow of all those traditions of the Fathers, of which he had been taught to be so exceeding zealous. To this new cause he now devoted himself, and probably at this time labored “in the regions of Cilicia,” until a new apostolic summons called him to a distant field. He was yet “personally unknown to the churches of Judea, which were in Christ; and they had only heard, that he who persecuted them in times past, now preached the faith which once he destroyed; they therefore glorified God on his account.” The very beginnings of his apostolic duties were therefore in a foreign field, and not within the original premises of the lost sheep of the house of Israel, where indeed he was not even known but by fame, except to a few in Jerusalem. In this he showed the great scope and direction of his future labors,――among the Gentiles, not among the Jews; leaving the latter to the sole care of the original apostles, while he turned to a vast field for which they were in no way fitted, by nature, or by apostolic education, nor were destined in the great scheme of salvation.

HIS APOSTOLIC LABORS IN ANTIOCH.

During this retirement of Saul to his native home, the first great call of the Gentiles had been made through the summons of Simon Peter to Cornelius. There was manifest wisdom in this arrangement of events. Though the original apostles were plainly never intended, by providence, to labor to any great extent in the Gentile field, yet it was most manifestly proper that the first opening of this new field should be made by those directly and personally commissioned by Jesus himself, and who, from having enjoyed his bodily presence for so long a time, would be considered best qualified to judge of the propriety of a movement so novel and unprecedented in its character. The great apostolic chief was therefore made the first minister of grace to the Gentiles; and the violent opposition with which this innovation on Judaical sanctity was received by the more bigoted, could of course be much more efficiently met, and disarmed, by the apostle specially commissioned as the keeper of the keys of the heavenly kingdom, than by one who had been but lately a persecutor of the faithful, and who, by his birth and partial education in a Grecian city, had acquired such a familiarity with Gentile usages, as to be reasonably liable to suspicion, in regard to an innovation which so remarkably favored them. This great movement having been thus made by the highest Christian authority on earth,――and the controversy immediately resulting having been thus decided,――the way was now fully open for the complete extension of the gospel to the heathen, and Saul was therefore immediately called, in providence, from his retirement, to take up the work of evangelizing Syria, which had already been partially begun at Antioch, by some of the Hellenistic refugees from the persecution at the time of Stephen’s martyrdom. The apostles at Jerusalem, hearing of the success which attended these incidental efforts, dispatched their trusty brother Barnabas, to confirm the good work, under the direct commission of apostolic authority. He, having come to Antioch, rejoiced his heart with the sight of the success which had crowned the work of those who, in the midst of the personal distress of a malignant persecution, that had driven them from Jerusalem, had there sown a seed that was already bringing forth glorious fruits. Perceiving the immense importance of the field there opened, he immediately felt the want of some person of different qualifications from the original apostles, and one whose education and habits would fit him not only to labor among the professors of the Jewish faith, but also to communicate the doctrines of Christ to the Grecians. In this crisis he bethought himself of the wonderful young convert with whom he had become acquainted, under such remarkable circumstances, a few years before, in Jerusalem,――whose daring zeal and masterly learning had been so signally manifested among the Hellenists, with whom he had formerly been associated as an equally active persecutor. Inspired both by considerations of personal regard, and by wise convictions of the peculiar fitness of this zealous disciple for the field now opened in Syria, Barnabas immediately left his apostolic charge at Antioch, and went over to Tarsus, to invite Saul to this great labor. The journey was but a short one, the distance by water being not more than one hundred miles, and by land, around through the “Syrian gates,” about one hundred and fifty. He therefore soon arrived at Saul’s home, and found him ready and willing to undertake the proposed apostolic duty. They immediately returned together to Antioch, and earnestly devoted themselves to their interesting labors.

“Antioch, the metropolis of Syria, was built, according to some authors, by Antiochus Epiphanes; others affirm, by Seleucus Nicanor, the first king of Syria after Alexander the Great, in memory of his father Antiochus, and was the ‘royal seat of the kings of Syria.’ For power and dignity, Strabo, (lib. xvi. p. 517,) says it was not much inferior to Seleucia, or Alexandria. Josephus, (lib. iii. cap. 3,) says, it was the third great city of all that belonged to the Roman provinces. It was frequently called Antiochia Epidaphne, from its neighborhood to Daphne, a village where the temple of Daphne stood, to distinguish it from other fourteen of the same name mentioned by Stephanus de Urbibus, and by Eustathius in Dionysius p. 170; or as Appianus (in Syriacis,) and others, sixteen cities in Syria, and elsewhere, which bore that name. It was celebrated among the Jews for ‘Jus civitatis,’ which Seleucus Nicanor had given them in that city with the Grecians and Macedonians, and which, says Josephus, they still retain, Antiquities, lib. xii. cap. 13; and for the wars of the Maccabeans with those kings. Among Christians, for being the place where they first received that name, and where Saul and Barnabas began their apostolic labors together. In the flourishing times of the Roman empire, it was the ordinary residence of the prefect or governor of the eastern provinces, and also honored with the residence of many of the Roman emperors, especially of Verus and Valens, who spent here the greatest part of their time. It lay on both sides of the river Orontes, about twelve miles from the Mediterranean sea.” (Wells’s Geography New Testament――Whitby’s Table.) (J. M. Williams’s Notes on Pearson’s Annales Paulinae.)

Having arrived at Antioch, Saul gave himself, with Barnabas, zealously to the work for which he had been summoned, and labored among the people to good purpose, assembling the church and imparting to all that would hear, the knowledge of the Christian doctrine. Under these active exertions the professors of the faith of Jesus became so numerous and so generally known in Antioch, that the heathen inhabitants found it convenient to designate them by a distinct appellation, which they derived from the great founder and object of their religion,――calling them Christians, because the heathen inhabitants of Syria were not acquainted with the terms, “Nazarene” and “Galilean,” which had been applied to the followers of Christ by the Jews, partly from the places where they first appeared, and partly in opprobium for their low provincial origin.

The name now first created by the Syrians to distinguish the sect, is remarkable, because being derived from a Greek word, Christos, it has a Latin adjective termination, Christianus, and is therefore incontestably shown to have been applied by the Roman inhabitants of Antioch; for no Grecian would ever have been guilty of such a barbarism, in the derivation of one word from another in his own language. The proper Greek form of the derivation would have been Christicos, or Christenos, and the substantive would have been, not Christianity, but Christicism, or Christenism,――a word so awkward in sound, however, that it is very well for all Christendom, that the Roman barbarism took the place of the pure Greek termination. And since the Latin form of the first derivative has prevailed, and Christian thus been made the name of “a believer in Christ,” it is evident to any classical scholar, that Christianity is the only proper form of the substantive secondarily derived. For though the appending of a Latin termination upon a Greek word, as in the case of Christianus, was unquestionably a blunder and a barbarism in the first place, it yet can not compare, for absurdity, with the notion of deriving from this Latin form, the substantive Christianismus, with a Greek termination foolishly pinned to a Latin one,――a folly of which the French are nevertheless guilty. The error, of course, can not now be corrected in that language; but those who stupidly copy the barbarism from them, and try to introduce the monstrous word, ChristianISM, into English, deserve the reprobation of every man of taste.

“Before this they were called ‘disciples,’ as in this place――‘believers,’ Acts v. 14――‘men of the church,’ Acts xii. 1――‘men of the way,’ Acts ix. 2――‘the saints,’ Acts ix. 13――‘those that called on the name of Christ,’ verse 14――and by their enemies, Nazarenes and Galileans, and ‘men of the sect;’――but now, by the conversion of so many heathens, both in Caesarea and Antioch, the believing Jews and Gentiles being made all one church, this new name was given them, as more expressive of their common relation to their Master, Christ. Whitby slightly alludes to the prophecy, Isaiah lxv.” (J. M. Williams’s Notes on Pearson.)

While Saul was thus effectually laboring in Antioch, there came down to that city, from Jerusalem, certain persons, indued with the spirit of prophecy, among whom was one, named Agabus, who, under the influence of inspiration, made known that there would be a great famine throughout the world;――a prediction which was verified by the actual occurrence of this calamity in the days of Claudius Caesar, during whose reign,――as appears on the impartial testimony of the historians of those times, both Roman and Jewish,――the Roman empire suffered at different periods in all its parts, from the capital to Jerusalem,――and at this latter city, more especially, in the sixth year of Claudius, (A. D. 46,) as is testified by Josephus, who narrates very particularly some circumstances connected with the prevalence of this famine in Jerusalem. The disciples at Antioch, availing themselves of this information, determined to send relief to their brethren in Judea, before the famine should come on; and having contributed, each one according to his ability, they made Barnabas and Saul the messengers of their charity, who were accordingly dispatched to Jerusalem, on this noble errand. They remained in Jerusalem through the period of Agrippa’s attack upon the apostles by murdering James, and imprisoning Peter; but they do not seem to have been any way immediately concerned in these events; and when Peter had escaped, they returned to Antioch. How long they remained here, is not recorded; but the date of subsequent events seems to imply that it was a space of some years, during which they labored at Antioch in company with several other eminent prophets and teachers, of whom are mentioned Simeon, who had the Roman surname of Niger, Lucius, the Cyrenian, and Manaen, a foster-brother of Herod the tetrarch. During their common ministrations, at a season of fasting, they received a direction from the spirit of truth which guided them, to set apart Saul and Barnabas for the special work to which the Lord had called them. This work was of course understood to be that for which Saul in particular, had, at his conversion, been so remarkably commissioned,――“to open the eyes of the Gentiles,――to turn them from darkness to light, and from the dominion of Satan to God.” His brethren in the ministry therefore, understanding at once the nature and object of the summons, now specially consecrated both him and Barnabas for their missionary work; and after fasting and praying, they invoked on them the blessing of God, in the usual oriental form of laying their hands on them, and then bade them farewell.

“That this famine was felt chiefly in Judea may be conjectured with great reason from the nature of the context, for we find that the disciples are resolving to send relief to the elders in Judea; consequently they must have understood that those in Judea would suffer more than themselves. Josephus declared that this famine raged so much there, πολλῶν ὑπό ἐνδείας ἀναλωμάτων φθειρομένων, ‘so that many perished for want of victuals.’”

“‘Throughout the whole world,’ πᾶσαν τὴν οἰκουμένην, is first to be understood, orbis terrarum habitabilis: Demosthenes in Corona, Æschines contra Ctesiphon Scapula. Then the Roman and other empires were styled οικουμένη, ‘the world.’ Thus Isaiah xiv. 17, 26, the counsel of God against the empire of Babylon, is called his counsel, ἐπὶ τὴν ὅλην οἰκουμένην, ‘against all the earth.’――(Elsley, Whitby.) Accordingly Eusebius says of this famine, that it oppressed almost the whole empire. And as for the truth of the prophecy, this dearth is recorded by historians most averse to our religion, viz., by Suetonius in the life of Claudius, chapter 18, who informs us that it happened ‘ob assiduas sterilitates;’ and Dion Cassius History lib. lx. p. 146, that it was λιμὸς ἰσχυρὸς, ‘a very great famine.’ Whitby’s Annotations, Doddridge enumerates nine famines in various years, and parts of the empire, in the reign of Claudius; but the first was the most severe, and affected particularly Judea, and is that here meant.” (J. M. Williams’s notes on Pearson.)

HIS FIRST APOSTOLIC MISSION.

Going from Antioch directly eastward to the sea, they came to Seleucia, the nearest port, only twelve miles from Antioch, and there embarked for the island of Cyprus, the eastern end of which is not more than eighty miles from the coast of Syria. The circumstance that more particularly directed them first to this island, was probably that it was the native home of Barnabas, and with this region therefore he would feel so much acquainted as to know its peculiar wants, and the facilities which it afforded for the advancement of the Christian cause; and he would also know where he might look for the most favorable reception. Landing at Salamis, on the south-eastern part of the island, they first preached in the synagogues of the Jews, who were very numerous in Cyprus, and constituted so large a part of the population of the island, that some years afterwards they attempted to get complete possession of it, and were put down only by the massacre of many thousands. Directing their efforts first to these wandering sheep of the house of Israel, the apostles everywhere preached the gospel in the synagogues, never forsaking the Jews for the Gentiles, until they had been driven away by insult and injury, that thus the ruin of their nation might lie, not upon the apostles, but upon them only, for their rejection of the repeated offers of salvation. Here, it would seem, they were joined by John Mark, the nephew of Barnabas, who was probably staying upon the island at that time, and who now accompanied them as an assistant in their apostolic ministry. Traversing the whole island from east to west, they came to Paphos, a splendid city near the western end, famed for the magnificent temple and lascivious worship of the Paphian Venus, a deity to whom all Cyprus was consecrated; and from it she derived one of her numerous appellatives, Cypris being a name under which she was frequently worshipped; and the females of the island generally, were so completely devoted to her service, not merely in temple-worship, but in life and manners, that throughout the world, the name Cyprian woman, even to this day, is but a polite expression for one abandoned to wantonness and pleasure. The worship of this lascivious goddess, the apostles now came to exterminate, and to plant in its stead the dominion of a faith, whose essence is purity of heart and action. At this place, preaching the gospel with openness, they soon attracted such general notice, that the report of their remarkable character soon reached the ears of the proconsul of Cyprus, then resident in Paphos. This great Roman governor, by name Sergius Paulus, was a man of intelligence and probity, and hearing of the apostles, soon summoned them to his presence, that he might have the satisfaction of hearing from them, in his own hall, a full exposition of the doctrine which they called the word of God. This they did with such energy and efficiency, that they won his attention and regard; and he was about to profess his faith in Jesus, when a new obstacle to the success of the gospel was presented in the conduct of one of those present at the discourse. This was an impostor, called Elymas,――a name which seems to be a Greek form of the Oriental “Alim” meaning “a magician,”――who had, by his tricks, gained a great renown throughout that region, and was received into high favor by the proconsul himself, with whom he was then staying. The rogue, apprehending the nature of the doctrines taught by the apostles to be no way agreeable to the schemes of self-advancement which he was so successfully pursuing, was not a little alarmed when he saw that they were taking hold of the mind of the proconsul, and therefore undertook to resist the preaching of the apostles; and attempted to argue the noble convert into a contempt of these new teachers. At this, Saul, (now first called Paul,) fixing his eyes on the miserable impostor, in a burst of inspired indignation, denounced on him an awful punishment for his resistance of the truth. “O, full of all guile and all tricks! son of the devil! enemy of all honesty! wilt thou not stop perverting the ways of the Lord? And now, lo! the hand of the Lord is on thee, and thou shalt be blind, not seeing the sun for a time.” And immediately there fell on him a mist and a darkness; and turning around, he sought some persons to lead him by the hand. At the sight of this manifest and appalling miracle, thus following the denunciation of the apostle, the proconsul was so struck, that he no longer delayed for a moment his profession of faith in the religion whose power was thus attested, but believed in the doctrine of Jesus, as communicated by his apostles.

“Seleucia was a little north-west of Antioch, upon the Mediterranean sea, named from its founder, Seleucus.――Cyprus, so called from the flower of the Cypress-trees growing there.――Pliny, lib. xii. cap. 24.――Eustathius. In Dionysius p. 110. It was an island, having on the east the Syrian, on the west the Pamphylian, on the south the Phoenician, on the north the Cilician sea. It was celebrated among the heathens for its fertility as being sufficiently provided with all things within itself. Strabo, lib. xiv. 468, 469. It was very infamous for the worship of Venus, who had thence her name Κύπρις. It was memorable among the Jews as being an island in which they so much abounded; and among Christians for being the place where Joses, called Barnabas, had the land he sold, Acts iv. 36; and where Mnason, an old disciple, lived; Acts xxi. 16.――(Whitby’s Table.) Salamis was once a famous city of Cyprus, opposite to Seleucia, on the Syrian coast.――(Wells.) It was in the eastern part of Cyprus. It was famous among the Greek writers for the story of the Dragon killed by Chycreas, their king; and for the death of Anaxarchus, whom Nicocreon, the tyrant of that island, pounded to death with iron pestles.”――(Bochart, Canaan, lib. i. c. 2――Laert, lib. ix. p. 579.) Williams’s Pearson.

Proconsul.――The Greek title Ανθυπατος, was applied only to those governors of provinces who were invested with proconsular dignity. ‘And on the supposition that Cyprus was not a province of this description, it has been inferred that the title given to Sergius Paulus in this place, was a title that did not properly belong to him. A passage has indeed been quoted from Dion Cassius, (History of Rome, lib. liv. p. 523, edited by Hanoviae, 1690,) who, speaking of the governors of Cyprus and some other Roman provinces, applies to them the same title which is applied to Sergius Paulus. But, as Dion Cassius is speaking of several Roman provinces at the same time, one of which was certainly governed by a proconsul, it has been supposed, that for the sake of brevity, he used one term for all of them, whether it applied to all of them or not. That Cyprus, however, ought to be excluded, and that the title which he employed, as well as St. Luke, really did belong to the Roman governors of Cyprus, appears from the inscription on a coin belonging to Cyprus itself. It belonged to the people of that island as appears from the word ΚΥΠΡΙΩΝ on the reverse: and, though not struck while Sergius Paulus himself was governor, it was struck, as appears from the inscription on the reverse, in the time of Proclus, who was next to Sergius Paulus in the government of Cyprus. And, on this coin the same title ΑΝΘΥΠΑΤΟΣ, is given to Proclus, which St. Luke gives Sergius Paulus.’ (Bishop Marsh’s Lecture part v. pp. 85, 86.) That Cyprus was a proconsulate, is also evident ♦from an ancient inscription of Caligula’s reign, in which Aquius Scaura is called the proconsul of Cyprus. (Gruteri Corpus Inscriptionem, tom. i. part ii. p, cccix. No. 3, edited by Graevii Amsterdam, 1707.) Horne’s Introd.

HIS CHANGE OF NAME.

In connection with this first miracle of the apostle of Tarsus, it is mentioned by the historian of the Acts of the Apostles, that Saul thenceforth bore the name of Paul, and the reader is thence fairly led to suppose, that the name was taken from that of Sergius Paul, who is the most important personage concerned in the event; and being the first eminent man who is specified as having been converted by the apostle, seems therefore to deserve, in this case, the honor of conferring a new name on the wonder-working Saul. This coincidence between the name and the occasion, may be justly esteemed sufficient ground for assuming this as the true origin of the name by which the apostle was ever after designated,――which he applies to himself in his writings, and by which he is always mentioned throughout the Christian world, in all ages. With the name of “Saul of Tarsus,” there were too many evil associations already inseparably connected, in the minds of all the Jewish inhabitants of the east, and the troublesome character of those prevalent impressions having been perhaps particularly obvious to the apostle, during his first missionary tour, he seized this honorable occasion, to exchange it for one that had no such evil associations; and he was therefore afterwards known only by the name of PAUL.

Embarking at Paphos, the apostles, after doubling cape Acamas, the most western point of the island, sailed northwestward, towards the northern coast of Asia Minor,――and after a voyage of about two hundred miles, reached Perga, a city in Pamphylia. This place was not a sea-port, but stood on the west bank of the river Cestrus, about eight miles from the sea. It was there built by the Attalian kings of south-western Asia, and was by them made the most splendid city of Pamphylia. Near the town, and on a rising ground, was a very famous temple of Diana, to which every year resorted a grand religious assembly, to celebrate the worship of this great Asian goddess. In such a strong hold of heathenism, the apostles must have found much occasion for the preaching of the gospel; but the historian of their Acts gives no account of anything here said or done by them, and only mentions that at this place their companion, John Mark, gave up his ministration with them, and returned to Jerusalem. Paul and Barnabas then went on without him, to the north, and proceeded, without any material delay, directly through Pamphylia, and over the ranges of Taurus, through Pisidia, into Phrygia Katakekaumene, where they made some stay at the city of Antioch, which was distinguished from the great capital of Syria bearing the same royal name, by being called “Antioch of Pisidia,” because, though really within the boundaries of Phrygia, it was often numbered among the cities of the province next south, near whose borders it stood, and was therefore associated with the towns of Pisidia by those who lived south and east of them. At this place the apostles probably arrived towards the last of the week, and reposing here on the sabbath, they went into the Jewish synagogue, along with the usual worshiping assembly, and took their seats quietly among the rest. After the regular service of the day (consisting of the reading of select portions of the law and the prophets) was over, the minister of the synagogue, according to custom, gave an invitation to the apostles to preach to the people, if they felt disposed to do so. It should be noticed, that in the Jewish synagogues, there was no regular person appointed to preach, the minister being only a sort of reader, who conducted the devotions of the meeting, and chanted the lessons from the Scriptures, as arranged for each sabbath. When these regular duties were over, the custom was to invite a discourse from any person disposed or qualified to address the people,――the whole being always thus conducted somewhat on the plan of a modern “conference meeting.” On this day, the minister, noticing two grave and intelligent-looking persons among the worshipers, joining devoutly in the service of God, and perceiving them to be of a higher order than most of the assembly, or perhaps having received a previous hint of the fact that they were well-qualified religious teachers, who had valuable doctrines to communicate to the people,――sent word to them, “Brethren! if you have any word of exhortation for the people, say on.” Paul then,――as usual, taking the precedence of Barnabas in speaking, on account of his own superior endowments as an orator,――addressed the meeting, beginning with the usual form of words, accompanied with a graceful gesticulation, beseeching their favor. “Men of Israel! and you that fear God! give your attention.” The two different classes of persons included in this formula, are evidently, first, those who were Jews by birth and education, and second, those devout Gentiles who reverenced the God of Israel and conformed to the law of Moses, worshiping with the Jews on the sabbath. Paul, in his sermon, which was of considerable length, began in the usual form of an apostolic discourse to the Jews, by recurring to the early Hebrew history, and running over the great leading events and persons mentioned in their sacred writings, that might be considered as preparing the way for the Messiah. Then, proceeding to the narration of the most important points in the history of the new dispensation, he applied all the quoted predictions of the inspired men of old, to the man Christ Jesus, whom they now preached. The substance of his discourse was, that in Jesus Christ were fully accomplished those splendid prophecies contained in the Psalms, concerning the future glories of the line of David; and more especially that by his attested resurrection he had fulfilled the words spoken by the Psalmist, of the triumphs of the “Holy One” over the grave and corruption. Paul thus concluded,――“Be it known to you therefore, brethren, that through this man is preached to you forgiveness of sins; and every one that believes in him is justified from all things, from which you could not be justified by the law of Moses. Beware therefore, lest that come upon you which is spoken by the prophets,――‘See! you despisers! and wonder and be amazed; for I will do a work in your days, which you shall not believe, even if one should tell it to you.’” These denunciatory concluding words are from the prophet Habakkuk, where he is foretelling to the Israelites of his day, the devastating invasion of the Chaldeans; and the apostle in quoting them, aimed to impress his hearers with the certainty of similar evils to fall upon their nation,――evils so tremendous, that they might naturally disbelieve the warning, if it should give them the awful particulars of the coming ruin, but whose solemn truth they would, nevertheless, too soon learn in its actual accomplishment. These words being directed in a rather bitter tone of warning to the Jews in particular, that portion of the audience do not appear to have been much pleased with his address; but while the most of them were retiring from the synagogue, the Gentiles declared their high satisfaction with the discourse, and expressed an earnest desire that it might be repeated to them on the next sabbath,――a request with which ministers in these modern times are very rarely complimented by their congregations. After the meeting broke up, many of the audience were so loth to part with preachers of this extraordinary character, that they followed the apostles to their lodgings. These were mostly the religious proselytes from the heathen who worshiped with the Jews in the synagogue, but some even of the Jews were so well satisfied with what they had heard, that they also accompanied the throng that followed the apostles. Paul and Barnabas did not suffer this occasion to pass unimproved; but as they went along, discoursed to the company, exhorting them to stand fast in the grace of God. They continued in the city through the week, and meanwhile the fame of their doctrines and their eloquence extended so fast and so far, that when on the next sabbath they went to the synagogue to preach according to promise, almost the whole city came pouring in, along with them, to hear the word of God. But when the Jews, who had already been considerably displeased by the manner in which they had been addressed the last sabbath, saw the multitudes which were thronging to hear these new interlopers, they were filled with envy, and when Paul renewed his discourse, they openly disputed him,――denied his conclusions, and abused him, and his doctrine. Paul and Barnabas, justly indignant at this exhibition of meanness, that thus set itself against the progress of the truth among the Gentiles, from whom the Jews, not content with rejecting the gospel themselves, would also exclude the light of the word,――boldly declared to them――“It was necessary that the word of God should be first spoken to you; but since you have cast it off, and thus evince yourselves unworthy of everlasting life,――behold, we turn to the heathen. For thus did God command us, ‘I have set thee for a light to the heathen, that thou mightest be for their salvation, even to the uttermost part of the earth.’” And the heathen hearing this, rejoiced, and glorified the word of the Lord, and many of them believed, to their everlasting salvation. And the word of God was spread throughout that whole country; but the opposition of the Jews increasing in proportion to the progress of the faith of Christ, a great disturbance was raised against the apostles among the aristocracy of the city, who favored the Jews, and more especially among the women of high family, who were proselytes; and the result of the commotion was, that the apostles were driven out of the city. Paul and Barnabas, in conformity to the original injunction of Jesus to the twelve, shook off the dust of their feet, as an expressive testimony against them,――and turning eastward, came to another city, named Iconium, in Lycaonia, the most eastern province of Phrygia.

Lycaonia is a province of Asia Minor, accounted the southern part of Cappadocia, having Isauria on the west, Armenia Minor on the east, and Cilicia on the south. Its chief cities are all mentioned in this chapter xiv. viz., Iconium, Lystra, and Derbe. They spake in the Lycaonian tongue, verse 10, which is generally understood to have been a corrupt Greek, intermingled with many Syriac words.――Horne’s Introduction.

Iconium was the capital of Lycaonia, and is mentioned by the Grecian and Roman writers, before and after the apostolic times, as a place of some importance; but nothing definite is known of its size and character. It appears, at any rate, from the apostolic record, that this flourishing city was one of the numerous centers of the Jewish population, that filled so much of Asia Minor; and here, according to their custom, the apostles made their first communication of the gospel, in the Jewish synagogue. Entering this place of worship, they spoke with such effect, that a great number both of Greeks and Jews were thoroughly convinced of the truth of the Christian doctrine, and professed their faith in Jesus. But, as usual, there was in Iconium a great residue of bigoted adherents to the Mosaic faith, who could appreciate neither the true scope of the ancient dispensation, nor the perfection of gospel truth; and a set of these fellows undertook to make trouble for the apostles, in the same way that it had been done at the Pisidian Antioch. Not having power or influence enough among themselves to effect any great mischief, they were obliged to resort to the expedient of exciting the ill-will of the Gentile inhabitants and rulers of the city, against the objects of their mischievous designs,――and in this instance were successful, inasmuch as “they made their minds disaffected against the brethren.” But in spite of all this opposition, thus powerfully manifested, “long time they abode there, speaking boldly in the Lord,” who did not fail to give them the ever-promised support of his presence, but “gave testimony to the word of his grace, and caused signs and miracles to be done by their hands.” The immediate effect of this bold maintenance of the truth was, that they soon made a strong impression on the feelings of the mass of the people, and created among them a disposition to defend the preachers of the word of heavenly grace, against the malice of their haters. The consequence of course was, that the whole city was directly divided into two great parties, one for and the other against the apostles. On one hand the supporters of the Jewish faction were bent upon driving out the innovators from the city, and on the other, the numerous audiences, who had been interested in the preaching of Paul and Barnabas, were perfectly determined to stand by the apostles at all hazards, and the whole city seems to have been on the eve of a regular battle about this difference. But it did not suit the apostles’ scheme to make use of such means for their own advancement or defence; and hearing that a grand crisis in affairs was approaching, in the opposition of the Jewish faction, they took the resolution of evading the difficulty, by withdrawing themselves quietly from the scene of commotion, in which there was but very little prospect of being useful, just then. The whole gang of their opponents, both Gentiles and Jews, rulers and commonalty, having turned out for the express purpose of executing popular vengeance on these odious agitators, by abusing and pelting them, the apostles, on getting notice of the scheme, moved off, before the mob could lay hands on them, and soon got beyond their reach, in other cities.

These fugitives from popular vengeance, after having so narrowly escaped being sacrificed to public opinion, turned their course southward, and stopped next on their adventurous route at the city of Lystra, also within Lycaonia, where they preached the gospel, and not only in the city and its immediate vicinity, but also throughout the whole surrounding region, and in the neighboring towns. In the progress of their labors in Lystra, they one day were preaching in the presence of a man who had been lame from his birth, being in exactly the same predicament with the cripple who was the subject of the first miracle of Peter and John, in the temple. This unfortunate auditor of Paul and Barnabas believed the word of truth which they preached; and as he sat among the rest, being noticed by the former apostle, was recognized as a true believer. Looking earnestly on him, Paul, without questioning him at all as to his faith, said to him at once, in a loud voice, “Rise, and stand on thy feet.” Instantly the man sprang up, and walked. When the people saw this amazing and palpable miracle, they cried out, in their Lycaonian dialect, “The gods are come down to us in the likeness of men.” Struck with this notion, they immediately sought to designate the individual deities who had thus honored the city of Lystra with their presence; and at once recognized in the stately form, and solemn, silent majesty of Barnabas, the awful front of Jupiter, the Father of all the gods; and as for the lively, mercurial person attending upon him, and acting, on all occasions, as the spokesman, with such vivid, burning eloquence,――who could he be but the attendant and agent of Jupiter, Hermes, the god of eloquence and of travelers? Full of this conceit, and anxious to testify their devout sense of this condescension, the citizens bustled about, and with no small parade brought out a solemn sacrificial procession, with oxen and garlands, headed by the priests of Jupiter, and were proceeding to offer a sacrifice in solemn form to the divine personages who had thus veiled their dignity in human shape, when the apostles, horror-struck at this degrading exhibition of the idolatrous spirit against which they were warring, and without a single sensation of pride or gratitude for this great compliment done them, ran in among the people, rending their clothes in the significant and fantastic gesture of true Orientals, and cried out with great earnestness, “Sirs! what do you mean? We also are men of like constitutions with yourselves, and we preach to you with the express intent that you should turn from these follies to the living God, who made heaven and earth and sea, and all that is in them.――He, indeed, in times past, left all nations to walk in their own ways. Yet he left himself not wholly without witness of his being and goodness, in that he did good, and gave us rain from heaven, and fruitful seasons, filling our hearts with food and gladness.” With these words of splendid eloquence and magnificent conception bursting from their lips in the inspiration of the moment,――the apostles, with no small ado, stopped the idolatrous folly of the Lystrans, who probably felt and looked very silly, when the mistake into which they had been drawn by a mere mob-cry, was shown to them. Indignant, not so much at themselves, who alone were truly blamable for the error, as against the persons who were the nobly innocent occasions of it,――they were in a state of feeling to overbalance this piece of extravagance by another,――much more wicked, because it was not mere nonsense, but downright cruelty. When, therefore, certain spiteful Jews came to Lystra from Antioch and Iconium, from which places they had been hunting, like hounds, on the track of the apostles, and told their abusive lies to the people about the character of these two strange travelers, the foolish Lystrans were easily persuaded to crown their absurdity by falling upon Paul, who seemed to be the person most active in the business. Having seized him, before he could slip out of their hands, as he usually did from his persecutors, they pelted him with such effect that he fell down as if dead; and they, with no small alacrity, dragged him out of the city as a mere carcase. But the mob had hardly dispersed, when he rose up, to the great wonder of the brethren who stood mourning about him, and went back with them into the city. The whole of this interesting series of events is a firm testimony to the honesty of the apostolic narrative, exhibiting, as it does, so fairly, the most natural, and at the same time, the most contemptible tendencies of the human character. Never was there given such a beautiful illustration of the value and moral force of public opinion! unless, perhaps, in the very similar case of Jesus, in Jerusalem:――“Hosanna,” to-day, and “Crucify him,” to-morrow. One moment, exalting the apostles to the name and honors of the highest of all the gods; the next, pelting them through the streets, and kicking them out of the city as a nuisance. The Bible is everywhere found to be just so bitterly true to human nature, and the whole world cannot furnish a story in which the character and moral value of popular movements are better exhibited than in the adventures of the apostles, as recorded by Luke.

Acts xiv. 12. “It has been inquired why the Lystrans suspected that Paul and Barnabas were Mercury and Jupiter? To this it may be answered, 1st. that the ancients supposed the gods especially visited those cities which were sacred to them. Now from verse 13, it appears that Jupiter was worshiped among these people; and that Mercury too was, there is no reason to doubt, considering how general his worship would be in so commercial a tract of Maritime Asia. (Gughling de Paulo Mercurio, p. 9, and Walch Spic. Antiquities, Lystra, p. 9.) How then was it that the priest of Mercury did not also appear? This would induce one rather to suppose that there was no temple to Mercury at Lystra. Probably the worship of that god was confined to the sea-coast; whereas Lystra was in the interior and mountainous country. 2. It appears from mythological history, that Jupiter was thought to generally descend on earth accompanied by Mercury. See Plautus, Amphitryon, 1, 1, 1. Ovid, Metamorphoses, 8, 626, and Fasti, 5, 495. 3. It was a very common story, and no doubt, familiar to the Lystrans, that Jupiter and Mercury formerly traversed Phrygia together, and were received by Philemon and Baucis. (See Ovid, Metamorphoses, 8, 611, Gelpke in Symbol. ad Interp. Acts xiv. 12.) Mr. Harrington has yet more appositely observed, (in his Works, p. 330,) that this persuasion might gain the more easily on the minds of the Lycaonians, on account of the well-known fable of Jupiter and Mercury, who were said to have descended from heaven in human shape, and to have been entertained by Lycaon, from whom the Lycaonians received their name.

“But it has been further inquired why they took Barnabas for Jupiter, and Paul for Mercury. Chrysostom observes, (and after him Mr. Fleming, Christology Vol. II. p. 226,) that the heathens represented Jupiter as an old but vigorous man, of a noble and majestic aspect, and a large robust make, which therefore he supposes might be the form of Barnabas; whereas Mercury appeared young, little, and nimble, as Paul might probably do, since he was yet in his youth. A more probable reason, however, and indeed the true one, (as given by Luke,) is, that Paul was so named, because he was the leading speaker. Now it was well known that Mercury was the god of eloquence. So Horace, Carmen Saeculare, 1, 10, 1. Mercuri facunde nepos Atlantis Qui feros cultus hominum recentum Voce formasti cantus. Ovid, Fasti, 5, 688. Macrobius, Saturnalia, 8, 8. Hence he is called by Jamblichus, de Mysteriis, θεὸς ὁ των λόγων ἡγεμὼν, a passage exactly the counterpart to the present one, which we may render, ‘for he had led the discourse.’” (Bloomfield’s Annotations, New Testament, Vol. IV. c. xiv. § 12.)

“They called Paul Mercury, because he was the chief speaker,” verse 12. Mercury was the god of eloquence. Justin Martyr says Paul is λόγος ἑρμηνευτικὸς καὶ πάντων διδάσκαλος, the word; that is, the interpreter and teacher of all men. Apology ii. p. 67. Philo informs us that Mercury is called Hermes, ὡς Ἑρμηνέα καὶ προφήτην τῶν θειων, as being the interpreter and prophet of divine things, apud Eusebius, Praeparatio evangelica, Lib. iii. c. 2. He is called by Porphyry παραστατικὸς, the exhibitor or representor of reason and eloquence. Seneca says he was called Mercury, quia ratio penes illum est. De Beneficiis, Lib. iv. cap. 7.――Calmet, Whitby, Stackhouse.

All this pelting and outcry, however, made not the slightest impression on Paul and Barnabas, nor had the effect of deterring them from the work, which they had so unpropitiously carried on. Knowing, as they did, how popular violence always exhausts itself in its frenzy, they without hesitation immediately returned by the same route over which they had been just driven by such a succession of popular outrages. The day after Paul had been stoned and stunned by the people of Lystra, he left that city with Barnabas, and both directed their course eastward to Derbe, where they preached the gospel and taught many. Then turning directly back, they came again to Lystra, then to Iconium, and then to Antioch, in all of which cities they had just been so shamefully treated. In each of these places, they sought to strengthen the faith of the disciples, earnestly exhorting them to continue in the Christian course, and warning them that they must expect to attain the blessings of the heavenly kingdom, only through much trial and suffering. On this return journey they now formally constituted regular worshiping assemblies of Christians in all the places from which they had before been so tumultuously driven as to be prevented from perfecting their good work,――ordaining elders in every church thus constituted, and solemnly, with fasting and prayer, commending them to the Lord on whom they believed. Still keeping the same route on which they had come, they now turned southward into Pamphylia, and came again to Perga. From this place, they went down to Attalia, a great city south of Perga, on the coast of Pamphylia, founded by Attalus Philadelphus, king of Pergamus. At this port, they embarked for the coast of Syria, and soon arrived at Antioch, from which they had been commended to the favor of God, on this adventurous journey. On their arrival, the whole church was gathered to hear the story of their doings and sufferings, and to this eager assembly, the apostles then recounted all that happened to them in the providence of God, their labors, their trials, dangers, and hair-breadth escapes, and the crowning successes in which all these providences had resulted; and more especially did they set forth in what a signal manner, during this journey, the door of Christ’s kingdom had been opened to the Gentiles, after the rejection of the truth by the unbelieving Jews; and thus happily ended Paul’s first great apostolic mission.

Bishop Pearson here allots three years for these journeys of the apostles, viz. 45, 46, and 47, and something more. But Calmet, Tillemont, Dr. Lardner, Bishop Tomline, and Dr. Hales, allow two years for this purpose, viz. 45 and 46; which period corresponds with our Bible chronology. (Williams on Pearson.)

THE DISPUTES ON THE CIRCUMCISION.

The great apostle of the Gentiles now made Antioch his home, and resided there for many years, during which the church grew prosperously. But at last some persons came down from Jerusalem, to observe the progress which the new Gentile converts were making in the faith; and found, to their great horror, that all were going on their Christian course, in utter disregard of the ancient ordinances of the holy Mosaic covenant, neglecting altogether even that grand seal of salvation, which had been enjoined on Abraham and all the faithful who should share in the blessings of the promise made to him; they therefore took these backsliders and loose converts, to task, for their irregularities in this matter, and said to them, “Unless you be circumcised ♦according to the Mosaic usage, you can not be saved.” This denunciation of eternal ruin on the Gentile non-conformists, of course made a great commotion among the Antiochians, who had been so hopefully progressing in the pure, spiritual faith of Christ,――and were not prepared by any of the instructions which they had received from their apostolic teachers, for any such stiff subjection to tedious rituals. Nor were Paul and Barnabas slow in resisting this vile imposition upon those who were just rejoicing in the glorious light and freedom of the gospel; and they at once therefore, resolutely opposed the attempts of the bigoted Judaizers to bring them under the servitude of the yoke which not even the Jews themselves were able to bear. After much wrangling on this knotty point, it was determined to make a united reference of the whole question to the apostles and elders at Jerusalem, and that Paul and Barnabas should be the messengers of the Antiochian church, in this consultation. They accordingly set out, escorted beyond the city by the church; and passing first directly southward, along the Phoenician coast, they next turned inland through Samaria, everywhere visiting the churches on the route, and making known to them the joyful story of the conversions among the Gentiles of Asia Minor, which was news to the Christians of Palestine, and caused great congratulations among them, at these unexpected triumphs of their common faith. Arriving at Jerusalem, they there, for the first time, gave to the twelve apostles, a detailed account of their long Asian mission; and then brought forward the grand question under debate. As soon as this point was presented, all the obstinate Jewish prejudices of that portion of the church who were of the order of the Pharisees, were instantly aroused,――and with great earnestness they insisted “that it was necessary to circumcise them, and to command them to keep the law of Moses.” This first meeting however, adjourned without coming to any conclusion; and the apostles and elders were called together again to consider upon the matter. As soon as they were assembled they all fell to disputing with great violence, and, of course, with no decisive or profitable result; but at last the great apostolic chief rising up, ended the debate with a very clear statement of the results of his own personal experience of the divine guidance in this matter, and with brief but decisive eloquence hushed their clamors, that they might give Barnabas and Paul a chance to declare in what manner God had sanctioned their similar course. The two apostles of the Gentiles then narrated what miracles and wonders God had wrought among the heathen by them. Such was the decisive effect of their exposition of these matters of fact, that all debate was checked at once; and James himself, the great leader of the Judaical order, rose to express his perfect acquiescence in the decision of the apostolic chief and the Hellenists. His opinion was, that only so much conformity to the Mosaic institutions should be required of the Gentile converts, as they might without inconvenience submit to, out of respect to the old covenant, and such observances as were necessary for the moral purity of a professing Christian of any nation. The whole assembly concurred; and it was resolved to dispatch two select persons out of their own company, to accompany Paul and Barnabas to Antioch, and thus by their special commission, enforce the decision of the apostolic and presbyterial council. The decision of the council was therefore committed to writing, in a letter which bore high testimony to the zeal and courage of Barnabas and Paul, as “men who had hazarded their lives for the sake of the gospel,”――and it was announced as the inspired decision of the apostles, elders and brethren, that the Gentile converts should not be troubled with any greater burden than these necessary things:――“That you abstain from things offered to idols, and from blood, and from things strangled, and from fornication;” and if they should only keep themselves from these, they would do well. Jude and Silas were the envoys commissioned with the charge of this epistle, and accordingly accompanied Paul and Barnabas back to Antioch.

“Those who maintained this position were Jews, of the sect of the Pharisees, Acts, xv. 5, converted to Christianity, but still too zealous for the observance of the law; and their coming immediately from Judea might make it rather believed, that the necessity of circumcision, in order to salvation, was a tenet of the apostles. The Jews themselves indeed were of different opinions in this matter, even as to the admission of a man into their religion. For some of them would allow those of other nations who owned the true God, and practised moral duties, to live quietly among them, and even without circumcision, to be admitted into their religion; whilst others were decidedly opposed to any such thing. Thus Josephus tells us that when Izates, the son of Helen, queen of Adiabene, embraced the Jews’ religion, Ananias, who converted him, declared that he might do it without circumcision; but Eleazer, another eminent Jew, maintained, that it was a great impiety in such circumstances, to remain uncircumcised; and this difference of opinion continued among the Jewish Christian converts, some allowing Gentiles to become converts to Christianity, without submitting to circumcision and the Jewish law: whilst others contended that without circumcision, and the observance of the law, their profession of the Christian faith would not save them.” (Stackhouse from Whitby and Beausobre.)

“It is very evident, that this is the same journey to which the apostle alludes in Galatians ii. First, from the agreement of the history here and the apostle’s relation in the epistle, as that ‘he communicated to them the gospel, which he preached among the Gentiles,’ Galatians ii. 2. which he now did, Acts xv. 4. That circumcision was not then judged necessary to the Gentiles, verse 3, as we find, Acts xv. 24, ‘that, when they saw the gospel of uncircumcision was committed to him, they gave to him and Barnabas the right hand of fellowship,’ Galatians ii. 9, as they did here, sending their very decree with one consent to the Gentiles, ‘by the hands of Paul and Barnabas,’ Acts xv. 22, 25, who were received by the ‘whole church,’ verse 4. and styled beloved,’ verse 25.

“Secondly, it appears unlikely that the apostle, writing this epistle about nine years after this council, should make no mention of a thing so advantageous to a cause he is pleading here, and so proper to confute the pretenses of the adversaries he disputes against. And,

“Thirdly, James, Peter, and John, being all the apostles now present at the council, the mention of their consent to his doctrine and practice was all that was necessary to his purpose to be mentioned concerning that council, It is no objection to this opinion, that we find no mention, in Acts xv. of Titus’s being with him; for he is not mentioned in the whole of the Acts, during which interval the journey must have happened.” (Whitby.)

“The Council of Jerusalem was assembled in the fourteenth year after St. Paul’s conversion. For the apostle adverts to this same journey, and determinately specifies the time in Galatians ii. 1, 2. Grotius is of opinion that four years should be here written instead of fourteen; who, nevertheless, allows, that the one mentioned in Galatians, is this journey to the Council. But the reason is evident why the apostle should date these years from the epoch of his conversion, from the scope of the first and second chapters. He styles himself an apostle, not of men, neither by man, chap. i. 1: he declared that his gospel was not according to men, and that he neither received nor learned it from men, but by the revelation of Jesus Christ, verses 11, 12. And this he proves to the Galatians by his conversion, which was not unknown to them. He begins with his strict profession of the Jewish religion, according to the tenets of the Pharisees, which ended in a most violent persecution of the Christians. Then he goes on to show how God revealed his Son to him, and that immediately he conferred not with flesh and blood, he neither held communion with any man, neither did he go up to Jerusalem to them that were apostles before him, by whom he could have been taught more fully the mind of God, ‘but went into Arabia,’ where he received the gospel by revelation; and he returned to Damascus, and preached the word of God to the confounding of the Jews: ‘Then after three years he went up to Jerusalem to see Peter.’ From all this it appears evident, that the epoch of these three years should commence at the time of his conversion. The same is to be said of the other epoch of the fourteen years. ‘Then, after fourteen years, I went up again to Jerusalem,’ chap. ii. 1, because the scope of both is the same,――and they both date from the same period of time. The word επειτα does not connect this sentence with that of the three years, as if the beginning of these should be dated from the close of those, because there is another επειτα which comes between these two texts, viz. in verse 21, of chap. i. where he begins to relate his travels in Syria and Cilicia, but does not specify the period of time he remained in those regions; therefore no chronological connexion can have been intended by him. The apostle still following up his design, says επειτα and παλιν, but neither does επειτα refer to his stay in Syria and Cilicia,――nor παλιν to his second coming to Jerusalem: for he had been with a second collection to Jerusalem, then suffering from famine, accompanied by Barnabas, but not by Titus; and because he then saw none of the apostles, he omitted mentioning that journey, considering it quite foreign to his present purpose.” (Pearson, Annales, 49.)

PAUL’S QUARREL WITH PETER.

The whole company of envoys, both Barnabas and Paul, the original messengers of the Syrian church, and Jude and Silas, the deputies of the apostolic college, presented the complete results of the Jerusalem consultation before a fall meeting of the whole congregation of believers at Antioch, and read the epistle of the council to them. The sage and happy exhortations which it contained were not only respectfully but joyfully received; and in addition to the comfort of these, the first written words of Christian inspiration, the two envoys, Jude and Silas, also discoursed to the church, commenting at more length on the apostolic message of which they were the bearers, and confirmed their hearers in the faith. After remaining there for some time, Jude bade them farewell, and returned to his apostolic associates; but Silas was so much pleased with the opportunities thus afforded him of doing good among the Gentiles, of whom he himself also was one, as his name shows,――that he stayed in Antioch after the departure of Jude, and labored along with Paul and Barnabas, teaching and preaching the word of the Lord, with many others also. This is commonly understood to be the time of Paul’s dissension with Peter, as mentioned in the epistle to the Galatians. The circumstances of this disagreeable occurrence have already been narrated and commented on, in the Life of Peter,――nor need anything additional be presented here in relation to Paul, except the observation, that his dispute with the chief apostle, and his harsh censure of his conduct, are very much in accordance with the impressions of his character, given in other passages of his life. He was evidently a man of violent and hasty passions; and is uniformly represented, both by his historian and by himself, as exceedingly bitter and harsh in his denunciations of all who differed from him on practical or speculative points, both before and after his calling to the apostleship; and this trait is manifested on such a variety of occasions, as to be very justly considered an inseparable peculiarity of his natural disposition and temperament. Doubtless there are many to whom it seems very strange, that the Apostle Paul should ever be spoken of as having been actually and truly angry, or ever having made an error in his conduct after his conversion; but there are instances enough to show that it was not a mere modest injustice to himself for him to tell the Lystran idolaters that he was a man of like passions with them,――but a plain matter of fact, made evident not only by his own noble and frank confession, but by many unfortunate instances throughout his recorded life. Yet there are a great many Protestants, who have been in the habit of making such a kind of idol or demi-god out of Paul, that they are as little prepared as the Lystrans to appreciate the human imperfections of his character; and if Paul himself could at this moment be made fully sensible of the dumb idolatrous reverence with which many of his modern and enlightened adorers regard him, he would be very apt to burst out in the same earnest and grieved tone, in which he checked the similar folly of the Lystrans,――“Sirs! why do ye these things? I also am a man of like passions with yourselves.”――“The spirit of divine truth which actuated me, and guided me in the way of light, by which I led others to life eternal, still did not make me anything more than a man,――a man in moral as in bodily weakness, nor exempt from liabilities to the accidents of passion, any more than to the pains of mortal disease. The Spirit that guided my pen in the record of eternal truth, and my tongue in the preaching of the word of salvation, did not exalt me above the errors, the failings and distresses of mortality; and I was still all my lifetime subject to the bondage of sin, groaning under that body of death, and longing for the day when I should pass away from the frailties and distresses of earth, to that state of being which alone is wholly sinless and pure.”

“From the opposition to St. Peter, which they suppose to be before the Council at Jerusalem, some would have it, that this Epistle to the Galatians was written before that Council; as if what was done before the Council could not be mentioned in a letter written after the Council. They also contend, that this journey, mentioned here by St. Paul, was not that wherein he and Barnabas went up to that Council to Jerusalem, but that mentioned Acts xi. 30; but this with as little ground as the former. The strongest reason they bring, is, that if this journey had been to the Council, and this letter after that Council, St. Paul would not certainly have omitted to have mentioned to the Galatians that decree. To which it is answered, 1. The mention of it was superfluous; for they had it already, see Acts xvi. 4. 2. The mention of it was impertinent to the design of St. Paul’s narrative here. For it is plain, that his aim, in what he relates here of himself, and his past actions, is to shew, that having received the gospel from Christ by immediate revelation, he had all along preached that, and nothing but that, everywhere; so that he could not be supposed to have preached circumcision, or by his carriage, to have shewn any subjection to the law; all the whole narrative following being to make good what he says, ♦chap. i. 11, ‘that the gospel which he preached was not accommodated to the humoring of men; nor did he seek to please the Jews (who were the men here meant) in what he taught.’ Taking this to be his aim, we shall find the whole account he gives of himself, from that verse 11 of chap. i., to the end of the second chapter, to be very ♠clear and easy, and very proper to invalidate the report of his preaching circumcision.” (Locke’s Paraphrase.)

“I conceive that this happened at the time here stated, because Paul intimates in Galatians ii. 11, that he was in Antioch when Peter came there; and Peter had never been to Antioch before Paul was in that city after the Council of Jerusalem; and besides the dissension between Paul and Barnabas, who was the intimate friend of Peter, appears to have originated here.” Pearson’s Annales Paul. (A. D. 50.)

A fine exhibition of a quibbling, wire-drawn argument, may be found in Baronius, (Annales, 51,) who is here put to his wits’ end to reconcile the blunt, “round, unvarnished tale,” in Paul’s own account, (in Galatians ii. 11‒14,) with the papistical absurdity of the moral infallibility of the apostles. He lays out an argument of five heavy folio pages to prove that, though Paul quarreled thus with Peter, yet neither of them was in the slightest degree to blame, &c. But the folly of explaining away the Scriptures in this manner, is not confined wholly to the bigoted, hireling historian of papal Rome; some of the boldest of protestants have, in the same manner, attempted to reconcile the statement of Paul with the vulgar notions of apostolic infallibility. Witsius (Vita Pauli, iv. 12,) expends a paragraph to show that neither of them was to blame; but following the usual course of anti-papist writers, he represents the great protestant idol, Paul, in altogether the most advantageous light, according to the perfectly proverbial peculiarity of the opponents of the church of Rome, who, in their apostolic distinctions, uniformly “rob Peter to pay Paul.”

PAUL’S QUARREL WITH BARNABAS.

The church of Antioch having thus made great advances under these very abundant and extraordinary instructions, the apostles began to turn their eyes again to a foreign field, and longed for a renewal of those adventurous labors from which they had now had so long a repose. Paul therefore proposed to Barnabas that they should go over their old ground again:――“Let us go again and visit our brethren in every city, where we have preached the word of the Lord, and see how they do.” To this frank and reasonable proposition, Barnabas readily agreed, and as it was desirable that they should have an assistant with them on this journey, he proposed that his nephew Mark should accompany them in this capacity as he had done on their former voyage. But Paul, remembering the manner in which he had forsaken them just as they were entering upon the arduous missionary fields of Asia Minor, refused to try again one who had once failed to do them the desired service, at a time when he was most needed. Yet Barnabas, being led, no doubt by his near relationship to the delinquent evangelist, to overlook this single deficiency, and perhaps, having good reason to think that he had now made up his mind to stick to them through thick and thin, through good and bad fortune, was disposed to give him another trial in the apostolic service, and therefore strongly urged Paul to accept of him as their common assistant in this new tour for which he was well fitted by his knowledge of the routes. Paul, however, no doubt irritated against Mark, for the wavering spirit already manifested by him at Perga, utterly refused to have anything to do with him after such a display of character, and wished to take some other person who had been tried in the good work with more satisfactory results as to his resolution and ability. Barnabas of course, was not at all pleased to have his sister’s son treated so slightingly, and refused to have any substitute whatever, insisting that Mark should go, while Paul was equally resolved that he should not. The conclusion of the whole matter was, that these two great apostles, the authorized messengers of God to the Gentiles, quarreled downright; and after a great deal of furious contention, they parted entirely from one another; and so bitter seems to have been the division between them that they are not known to have ever after been associated in apostolic labors, although they had been the most intimate friends and fellow-travelers for many years, standing by one another through evil and good report, through trials, perils, distresses and almost to death. A most lamentable exhibition of human ♦weakness marring the harmonious progress of the great scheme of evangelization! Yet it must be esteemed one of the most valuable facts relating to the apostles, that are recorded in the honest, simple, clear, and truly impartial narrative of Luke; because it reminds the Christian reader of a circumstance, that he might otherwise forget, in an undue reverence for the character of the apostles,――and that is, the circumstance that these consecrated ministers of the word of truth were, really and practically, in spite of their holiness, “men of like passions with ourselves,” and even in the arrangement of their apostolic duties, were liable to be governed by the impulses of human passion, which on a few occasions like this, acting in opposite directions in different persons at the same time, brought them into open collisions and disputes,――which, if men of their pure martyr-spirit, mostly too, under the guidance of a divine influence, could not avoid, nor could satisfactorily settle, neither may the unconsecrated historian of a later age presume to decide. Who was right and who was wrong in this difficulty, it is impossible to say; and each reader may judge for himself. It may be remarked, however, that Paul was no more likely to be right than Barnabas; he was a younger man, as it would appear from the circumstance that he is named after him in the apostolic epistle;――he was no more an apostle than Barnabas was; for both are thus named by Luke in his account of their first journey, and both were expressly called by a distinct revelation from the Holy Spirit to undertake the apostleship of the Gentiles together. Paul also is known to have quarreled with other persons, and especially with Peter himself, and that too without very just cause; and although Barnabas may have been influenced to partiality by his relationship to Mark, yet much also may be justly chargeable to Paul’s natural violence and bitterness of temper, which often led him into hasty acts, of which he afterwards repented, as he certainly did in this very case, after some time; for he repeatedly mentions Mark in his epistles in terms of regard, and what is most in point, declares him to be “profitable to him in the ministry.”